Free Days Out in Preston

Brockholes Nature Reserve has buildings as well as water and paths, which solves the problem that kills most wildlife days out with children: nowhere to go when it rains and nowhere to sit when someone has had enough. Having both means the visit can shift indoors without ending. Reserves also tend to have marked short routes as well as long ones, so the walk can match the youngest person present.

Harris Museum, Art Gallery and Library is all three in one building, which for a family means the visit can change character partway through without leaving. Children who lose interest in a gallery will often settle in a library, and a building that offers both is more forgiving than one that offers neither. Major civic buildings do go through refurbishment programmes, so it is worth checking what is currently open.

Avenham and Miller Park sit together above the river and are the more scenic of the two options, with slopes and formal planting rather than flat playing fields. Withy Grove Park is a more straightforward local park. Neither needs planning, booking or good timing, which is exactly their purpose: they are what you use when the day has already gone wrong and something has to be salvaged quickly.